EDITORIAL: Tulsa, Charlotte show two ways to react to police shootings

By Enterprise editorial staff

Published 4:00 am, Wednesday, September 28, 2016

It's a familiar and increasingly tragic story in America: On Sept. 16, a black man was shot and killed by a police officer in Tulsa, Okla., under controversial circumstances. Four days later, the same thing happened to another black man in Charlotte, N.C. Charlotte has been on edge ever since the incident and occasionally wracked by protests. Tulsa has been mostly peaceful. There's a reason for the difference.

Tulsa officials were reasonably transparent about the incident soon after it happened. Video from a police helicopter was quickly released. The white policewoman who killed the unarmed civilian was indicted for manslaughter when prosecutors said she didn't have a valid reason to shoot him.

In Charlotte, however, the case is murkier, and so was the city's response. The victim apparently had a gun although it's unclear whether he pointed it at officers or understood them. And it should be noted that the officer who shot him was black too.

But Charlotte officials resisted pleas to show body and dashboard camera video footage of the fatal shooting that could help citizens determine whether it was justified or not. They finally released the videos on Saturday, though the images didn't provide any clearcut evidence one way or another.

Ironically, on Saturday a new state law takes effect in North Carolina that makes it harder to obtain those kinds of police videos or recordings. Yet one of the reasons that technology exists is to help settle these disputes. Locking it up for weeks or months will invariably fuel the kind of public mistrust that is dividing Charlotte.

Granted, body or dashboard videos aren't the magic solution to these old controversies that some had hoped. The images may be inconclusive or subject to interpretation. Photos of bystanders or children may need to be blurred out. Even if the video provide strong evidence for the police or protesters, it's release could influence a jury pool.

But when public officials drag their feet unnecessarily on releasing it, people understandably grow more suspicious about why they're holding it back.

Every case is different. But in Texas or any state, the reaction to these controversies should be as much transparency as soon as possible.